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Pamela Ann Merritt, with her court-appointed defense lawyer, is said to have murdered her landlord and cashed in on other tenants. She claimed Colin Kerdachi faked his death and now lives in Africa.

DLNews Crime:

It's unbelievable that this number went well for so long...

A woman was arrested in Houston, Texas, for allegedly stabbing her landlord and collecting rent.

It all began in February 2021, as reported by Fox News, among others. In the middle of winter, which also had an unusually tight grip on Texas, landlord Colin Kerdachi (78) was suddenly reported missing. A winter storm and severe frost had previously caused power outages in the city.

Then, one of the tenants, Joe Guy, reported to the police with a suspicious observation: he had come home from a long trip. He found that Kerdachi had disappeared – but instead, Pamela Ann Merritt (43) was in the apartment and refused to go.

Police files on the case say Guy confronted her - and Merritt admitted the landlord was dead and that she killed him. The police then ordered a psychiatric examination - while there was still no sign of a body.

After the investigation, Merritt returned to the apartment building in October and remained at large. Until another witness, tenant Tabitha Pope called the police again.

She found large pools of blood and stains on the house's upper floors, a knife in a mailbox, and a bucket full of blood in a corner. What made the police suspicious, in addition to the creepy discovery, Pope told the cops that she had just moved into the house – and would pay the rent to Merritt and her partner Michael Brown.

Also, according to Pope, Merritt and Brown told her conflicting stories about Kerdachi: Merritt that Kerdachi had disappeared - Brown that he had died in a hospital.

Even when police finally found Kerdachi's remains under the house in December, the couple still tried to put the wrong lead: the remains belonged to "a dead dog." According to court records, Merritt tried to convince police officers that Kerdachi had faked his death and was now living in Africa. The blood residue from the house came, Merritt claimed, from rotting meat she discarded from the refrigerator.

An autopsy revealed that Kerdachi had been stabbed multiple times. In March, police arrested Brown. A short time later, charges were brought against Merritt. She is currently in Harris County Jail on $500,000 bail.